In-Game GMs, Where Did They Go?

I miss in game GMs, they made you feel like you had a guardian watching over you. On rare occasions they would show themselves in faction cities, usually doing funny stuff like turning all players around him/her into animals and other creatures. On even rarer occasions, they spoke in general or trade, just to prove that GMs are real or to warn a racist spammer that if they don't stop, they will get banned...

But most important of all... HACKERS, BOTTERS, EXPLOITERS, SPAMMERS, AND RACISTS WERE BANNED!

So... does anyone know what happened to them? It seems they have disappeared, as have the bans for the bad players I stated above.

Don't even try to defend Blizz this time, the whole "Pyramid" idea and "Ban Waves" do not work.

I think the rules changed sometime around TBC and the GM's had to format themselves into "No Fun" mode, ie no more costumes / city fights ect. I mean fuck, they dont even give you back lost gear anymore, they are just the typical customer help desk folk. Instead of actual Game Masters.

Hi all! I thought I might just chime in here. I'm not at liberty to go into the full reveal of everything that happens behind the scenes, but I think I can risk a bit of transparency here. Game Masters are still here (there), but our typical approach is not to interfere with the doings of the players, visibly in-game. I know that this is a bit of a departure from how things were a long while back, but it's an approach that was adopted many years ago. Every so often a report may pop up that a player had seen a Game Master, and although it's certainly possible for us to do so - in practice we had found that it became too much of a spectacle. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing, and oftentimes it could be fun - but in the grand scheme of things, we needed to focus on other ways of helping people than to drop in and hang out.

So think of us like the silent guardians of Azeroth. We're there, trust me If you ever need us, just drop us a line and we'll always do our best to help!

I think the rules changed sometime around TBC and the GM's had to format themselves into "No Fun" mode, ie no more costumes / city fights ect. I mean fuck, they dont even give you back lost gear anymore, they are just the typical customer help desk folk. Instead of actual Game Masters.

There's a web form now for lost gear, if yo need to use it more then once every 30 days, you are trying to game the system in some way for sure.

Originally Posted by Gaexion

The loss of the ability to pass on loot is the loss of the ability to choose. This is communism.

Originally Posted by Aevra

It's a #$^&*@ fantasy game. You're a blue space goat riding around on flying serpents killing dragons the size of continents. And you're wondering why a gryphon doesn't look like an eagle?

I think the rules changed sometime around TBC and the GM's had to format themselves into "No Fun" mode, ie no more costumes

Nope, during wotlk a GM helped me while i was stuck. He showed up as a green whelpling, and turned me into a pirate ^_^
They're rare yes

---------- Post added 2013-01-24 at 07:32 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Araxom

Hi all! I thought I might just chime in here. I'm not at liberty to go into the full reveal of everything that happens behind the scenes, but I think I can risk a bit of transparency here. Game Masters are still here (there), but our typical approach is not to interfere with the doings of the players, visibly in-game. I know that this is a bit of a departure from how things were a long while back, but it's an approach that was adopted many years ago. Every so often a report may pop up that a player had seen a Game Master, and although it's certainly possible for us to do so - in practice we had found that it became too much of a spectacle. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing, and oftentimes it could be fun - but in the grand scheme of things, we needed to focus on other ways of helping people than to drop in and hang out.

So think of us like the silent guardians of Azeroth. We're there, trust me If you ever need us, just drop us a line and we'll always do our best to help!

I remember back in vanilla when I still had the noob edge even at 60, had to contact GM because I was stuck.
They came to my aid then realised I'd wall jumped into old hyjal and got stuck on a tree...and I'd left HS in bank (I had bag issues back then) boy did I get a lecture lol

My old raid group once had an issue during FL, where we'd bugged out Alysrazor in such a way that she was engaged doing her AoE damage from the intermission while the trash was up - and she never resat. You basically got 1-shot if you went in there because you were in combat as soon as you zoned in. The GM we were in contact with actually zoned into the instance with us and joined our raid group. I remember him joining the raid group at 60 (I think it was) and dinging instantly to 85 shortly after. Was good fun.

i bet it was ghost crawler who stopped GMs popping in now n again, fekkin spoil sport as he is ;p. i used to see the odd GM ere n there, mostly in dala id see one or in ICC i seen GM a couple times spying .. but havent seen any since ICC days
bring back the GMs i say ;p surely they can have 10 mins at lunch time or wotever to show up n have some lols

I think the rules changed sometime around TBC and the GM's had to format themselves into "No Fun" mode, ie no more costumes / city fights ect. I mean fuck, they dont even give you back lost gear anymore, they are just the typical customer help desk folk. Instead of actual Game Masters.

Why would you expect them to give you your lost gear when there's a perfectly good tool that does that for you?